Scientific Research in Kangerlussuaq

Kangerlussuaq International Science Support - KISS



Kangerlussuaq has always been known for playing host to scientific research teams, who have used Kangerlussuaq as their base. Kangerlussuaq Airport now operates the Kangerlussuaq International Science Support (KISS) center which offers special hotel and support facilities to researchers.

Among the research teams firmly rooted in Kangerlussuaq are:


Kellyville Sondrestrom Radar

The "Sondrestrom Incoherent Scatter Radar" Research Centre is sited near the port in an unofficial township by the name of Kellyville. The Centre is financed by the USA's National Science Foundation and run by the American company SRI International in association with the Danish Meteorological Institute. The station's chief assignment is basic research into the ionosphere (and northern lights) and the outer atmosphere (incl. the depth of the ozone layer). For those interested, a sightseeing trip to Kellyville can be arranged by Greenland Tourism.


GRIP

GRIP - the Greenland Icecore Programme - is a European research programme organized under the European Science Foundation. Eight European countries have collaborated on drilling through the inland ice at its highest point 800 km north-east of Kangerlussuaq. After four years' work, drilling was completed at a depth of 3,028 metres in the summer of 1992. This means that the recorded icecore stretches 250,000 years back in time. Each and every snowstorm during that quarter of a million years is represented in the core. Analyses of the ice enable climatic and atmospheric changes to be charted back in time. The drilling crews, involving up to 50 people on the ice, were kept supplied from Kangerlussuaq, with many hundreds of tonnes of equipment being flown up onto the ice from the town. In coming years, there will be follow-up work before the field camp is finally closed.


PICO

PICO - the Polar Ice Coring Office - has been represented in Kangerlussuaq since the mid-seventies. PICO is now a department of the University of Alaska at Fairbanks, and its job is to support all American research under the National Science Foundation originating from Kangerlussuaq.

The main assignment of recent years has been support to American deep drilling, a parallel project to GRIP. In addition, PICO provides logistic support to many other projects, including research into Greenland's geology and in particular the study of Greenlandic falcons. Falcons ringed in Kangerlussuaq have been spotted on the east coast of the USA and in South America! In the summertime, PICO typically has a staff of four in Kangerlussuaq, but PICO is also represented at other times, depending on the scientific projects to be carried out.


The 109th Squadron

Even though the American base in Kangerlussuaq was closed down on October 1st 1992, the US Air Force is still represented. This is due to the USA being the only country in the world that has large aircraft fitted with skis (Hercules C-130) and able to land on the inland ice. These airplanes have been employed in civil research for many years, and at the moment PICO and GRIP are using them under contract to the US Air Force.


Information about KISS - Kangerlussuaq International Science Support

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